Acute traumatic joint injury in young adults leads to an increased risk for the development of osteoarthritis (OA) later in life irrespective of surgical intervention to stabilize the injured joint. Although the mechanism ...

Tetracyclines, a broad-spectrum class of antibiotics, were discovered in the late 1940s, and became widely used because of their important advantages: they are inexpensive, safe, demonstrate good oral absorption, and are ...

The activation of inflammatory responses, while critical for host defense, contributes to hepatic injury in numerous acute and chronic liver disease states as well as drug-induced liver injury (DILI). The interactions that ...

The study of human mutagenesis requires methods of measuring somatic mutations in normal human tissues and inherited mutations in human populations. Such methods should permit measurement of rare mutations in the presence ...

The varied movements of the epithelium play vital roles in the development and renewal of complex tissues, from the separation of tissues in the early embryo, to homeostasis in the adult. Their movement is intricately ...

Identification of effective drug targets to intervene, either as single agent therapy or in combination, is a critical question in drug development. As complexity of disease like cancer is revealed, it has become clear ...

The design and development of new proteins and small molecules has considerable practical application in medicine, industry, and basic science. Frequently, progress in this area is made by altering an existing small molecule ...

Endogenous and exogenous oxidants react with cellular macromolecules to generate a variety of electrophiles that react with DNA produce cytotoxic and mutagenic adducts. One source of such electrophiles is deoxyribose in ...

This thesis utilizes modeling approaches rooted in statistical physics and physical chemistry to investigate several aspects of cellular signal transduction at both the modular and global levels. Design principles of ...

Overall cancer mortality rates have risen from about 4% of all deaths in the early 20th century to about 25% of all deaths by the end of the century in the United States. To assess any potential hypotheses for this increase ...

Human Hepatitis B virus (HBV) is the prototype member of the family Hepadnaviridae that consists of enveloped, partially double stranded DNA viruses that specifically target hepatocytes for viral replication. Although a ...

Understanding the hepatotoxicity of drugs and chemicals is essential for progress in academic research, medical science and in the development of new pharmaceuticals. Studying hepatotoxicity in vitro is a challenging task ...

Malaria accounts for over 500,000 deaths each year. While malaria is caused by multiple distinct parasites of the genus Plasmodium, P. falciparum is responsible for the majority of morbidity and mortality due to the disease. ...

Upon exposure to environmental cues, protein modifications form a complex signaling network that dictates cellular response. In this thesis, we develop methods for using continuous logic-based models to aide our understanding ...